The Qualities of Wood by Mary Vensel White

fellow?’
    â€˜A few weeks ago. Tall, strapping guy?’
    â€˜Oh, Lonnie.’
    â€˜I saw him back there a couple of times, walking around. One night there was smoke coming up through the trees, so I came over to make sure everything was all right. He was cooking a pie or something, down in the ground.’
    â€˜Apple cobbler,’ she said.
    â€˜A real outdoorsman,’ Mr Stokes said, and Vivian couldn’t tell how he meant it.
    Lonnie had a rough, natural quality; at least to her, he seemed more at home outside. His career choice in construction attested to this, as did his hobbies: hunting, fishing, camping. How the two brothers grew up so differently was difficult to say. Vivian wasn’t much for nature, either. After eloping to Reno, Lonnie and his wife pitched a tent in the mountains for a week, which wasn’t her idea of a honeymoon at all. Grandma Gardiner’s house, surrounded by trees, tall grass and birdsong, was as close to nature as she ever wanted to get.
    â€˜Nice fella,’ Mr Stokes added. The sun highlighted the white amidst his dark hair.
    â€˜What did you tell him?’ she asked.
    â€˜When?’
    â€˜You said that he didn’t like it when you told him what to do.’
    â€˜Oh.’ He chuckled. ‘I did my Smokey the Bear impression, about starting fires in the woods.’
    Vivian laughed.
    â€˜Mrs Gardiner,’ he said, meeting her eyes. ‘Do you suppose you could do me a favour?’
    Vivian felt a churning in her stomach, a slight warning. ‘Oh, sure.’
    â€˜Just call me Abe, that’s all. Everyone in this town calls me Mr and it makes me feel awful old.’ He looked down, kicked at the dirt almost shyly. ‘I think it’s because my father insisted on it for himself. But I’m not my father.’
    She smiled, relieved. ‘Only if you’ll call me Vivian.’
    Mrs Brodie returned, the sheriff leading her by the elbow. Her face was pale, but she held herself erect and walked with recovered confidence, a comfortable awareness of her body that Vivian envied.
    Mr Stokes said goodbyes and headed home beyond the tree line. Vivian walked Mrs Brodie and the police to the driveway.
    â€˜Damn car is covered with dust from that road work,’ the sheriff said. ‘But it’s about time we got some civilization around here. You’d think we’re in the backwoods, the way the county doles out money.’
    Mrs Brodie reached out and clasped Vivian’s hand. ‘Thanks for letting us on your land.’
    â€˜It’s not my…’ Vivian started, but stopped. ‘You’re welcome,’ she said, and that seemed wrong too.
    â€˜We’ll meet again, when this is, well, at a better time,’ Mrs Brodie said. Daintily, she reached for Sheriff Townsend’s arm.
    The police car drove slowly over the packed dirt of the road and headed toward town. Vivian picked up the mail from the porch and looked through it. An assortment of advertisements, an electricity bill, a letter from Nowell’s agent. The road crew’s machinery was abandoned on the embankment. The dirt road was even and smooth, ready for asphalt in the morning.
    Nowell was standing in the kitchen when she got to the door. ‘Where were you?’ he called through the screen. ‘Did you see the sheriff?’
    â€˜Yeah. And the deputy, and that girl’s mother.’
    â€˜What happened?’ He pushed the door open.
    She walked under his outstretched arm into the kitchen. ‘Nothing, really. Mrs Brodie almost passed out when she saw me coming out of the woods.’
    â€˜The woods? What were you doing back there?’
    â€˜I went for a walk.’
    â€˜I don’t know if you should be back there, Viv.’
    â€˜Why not?’ She spun around. ‘Doesn’t anyone read the newspaper around here? What happened to that girl was an accident .’
    â€˜You don’t know your way